Well, how can I possibly pass that up? As a lover
of both fairy tales and traditional fairy lore, I'm always up for a good read
about the Fair Folk--and most importantly, if I ever own a chicken coop I'll be
well-prepared to defend it against goblins and buggaboos. Sounds like a good
deal to me.

I first heard of Goblinproofing One's Chicken
Coop because it was the 2013 winner of the Diagram Prize for Oddest Title of
the Year. If you read my post about the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, you know
I have a certain fondness for quirky literary contests. And if you don't know
about the Diagram Prize, it's pretty self-explanatory: it seeks to reward the
published book with the oddest title of the year. The first winner back in 1978
was Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice. Other
notable winners have been: The Joy of Chickens; The Book of Marmalade: Its
Antecedents, Its History, and Its Role in the World Today; Highlights in the
History of Concrete (yes, apparently there are highlights); Greek Rural Postmen
and Their Cancellation Numbers; Bombproof Your Horse; The Stray Shopping Carts
of Eastern North America: A Guide to Field Identification; as well as some
other titles I won't post here as we prefer Project Mayhem to remain a
family-friendly site.

And if you could really, really use a laugh this
Monday morning, pop by the Amazon.com page of the 1992 winner of the Diagram
Prize, How to Avoid Huge Ships, to read the customer reviews. Sadly, this fine
tome is no longer in print, but judging by the 550+ reviews on Amazon, it has a
lot of fans. (Or a lot of folks who need an exercise in creative writing have
found reviewing a book called How to Avoid Huge Ships fits the bill perfectly.)

DISCLAIMER

The authors of Project Mayhem do their best to provide accurate, witty, and sometimes manic information pertaining to all things middle grade. Any resemblance to anybody else's manic, witty, and accurate information is purely serendipitous. However, the views and opinions expressed herein are solely those of the individual authors, and do not necessarily reflect those of the other writers on this blog. Except, we all agree that reading Project Mayhem will brighten your day. Drop by mic.